John Lescroart - The Vig

"Okay, I know that. Don't get hurt, will you?"

Hardy smiled. "Hurt's not in the game plan."

He got the log-on from Lanier, who had been writing up a report in the otherwise deserted Homicide room, where he had gone to see if Abe had had a change of heart and come to work. No, in fact Abe had called in sick.

Hardy, saying he was referred by Tony Feeney, left a message where he'd be for Karen Moore when she got back, got himself a Diet Coke and found the room-a regular office with a solitary terminal on a pitted desk.

This was San Francisco's incident report-suspect computer. One terminal, no full-time operators. Random, unsupervised log-ons. They had not had anything when Hardy worked here, so he supposed this was an improvement, but it was still far from the state of the art.

He did not feel he was looking for anything, just killing time, but sometimes killing a few minutes could be productive. He typed in Louis Baker's name.

It was an interesting screen. According to the computer, Louis Baker-alias Lou Brock, Louis Clark, Lou Rawls (the guy had a sense of humor, all right), street name Puffer (whatever that meant)-was still doing his time in San Quentin.

Hardy wondered how far behind the computer's records were. He punched in Hector Medina, whose name did not appear at all. Well, that made some sense-he'd been cleared twice.

Ray Weir was in the database, though. Nine years ago -there it was again- he had been arrested for brawling at a Forty-Niners game. The arresting officer was not Medina. There was no record if Ingraham had been involved- he had pleaded nolo contendere and gotten off with a two-hundred-dollar fine. In '85 he got busted for misdemeanor marijuana possession-another hundred-dollar fine. He had an outstanding warrant on an unpaid parking ticket.

Hardy drank some Coke. So Ray was a brawler too, or had been. And, as Hardy already knew, a heavy user of marijuana, maybe other drugs. Emotional enough to cry in front of other people over his lost love. How emotionally unstable was he? What if he was on dope, strung out, violence prone, and had gone out, as Warren had at first suggested, to 'settle things' with Maxine? Ray's alibi, Hardy was thinking, had better be verifiable. He took down a few particulars from the screen on his yellow pad.

Rusty Ingraham's car-a blue '87 Volkswagen Jetta-had indeed been reported stolen on August 29. But that was all the computer had on Rusty. So the database wasn't more than about three weeks behind, which Hardy figured wasn't so bad. He was starting to take down the information on the car when there was a knock.

"Mr Hardy?"

Hardy stood up. "Sergeant Moore."

She laughed, perfect white teeth in a model's face. "Karen, please. Tony Feeney beckons, I jump. How can I help you?"

She boosted herself up like a schoolgirl on the edge of the desk. She was dressed in what looked like some kind of uniform, though it wasn't a set of patrolman's blues. The pants were baggy and a leather jacket with her sergeant's stripes covered her blouse. She looked bulky, which Hardy guessed was a good cover. Any kind of close look revealed a toned body on a short frame. If she wore any makeup she'd stop traffic. But she didn't, and with nothing to set off the high cheekbones, the deep-set black eyes, the wide sensuous mouth, she was only pretty. Very.

"I don't know if you can. I'm looking into something that happened a long time ago."

"For Tony? Is this an active case?"

"No, not strictly for Tony. He gave me your name."

She waited.

"It's a little personal," Hardy said. "Rusty Ingraham."

Warily. "Rusty Ingraham. There's a blast from the past. How is Rusty?"

"Actually, Rusty's dead, or appears to be." He explained the ambiguity.

"Well, I'm sorry to hear that," she said when he had finished.

"Are you?"

"Rusty and I were old news. We split up amicably enough."

"Tony Feeney acted like he'd just won the Lottery when he heard."

She nodded. "I'd believe that. Tony hated Rusty. A lot of people hated Rusty. I didn't. I felt sorry for him, finally."

"Finally?"

"Well, at first I was attracted to him. You knew him?"

Hardy nodded.

"Then you know. He was pretty charismatic. Very charismatic. Never lost a case, star of the show. That was Rusty. And I was this black single mother of a ten-year-old daughter and-"

"Excuse me, when was this?"

"We're talking I guess nine or ten years ago."

"And you had a ten-year-old then?" Hardy had been figuring her for her late twenties.

Karen laughed, acknowledging the compliment. "I'm thirty-six, Mr Hardy. And I'm also a grandmother, but thank you."

"You don't look like a grandmother."

"No, I know. I work at it, too. I like to think on a good day I can give my daughter a run."

"I'd bet on you. So back when she was ten you had this thing with Rusty."

"I was flattered. It was also the first white man I'd gone out with"-Hardy noted the "first"-"and at the time I saw it as a bit of a coup, you know. I didn't realize Rusty saw me -foxy young black chick-the same way. A conquest. Another victory."

He searched her eyes for some sign of pain or loss and saw none. Ingraham might have been an old schoolteacher, sometimes remembered, sometimes fondly.

"So how long did you two go out?"

She looked up at the ceiling. "I'd guess close to a year, maybe ten months. That was about his limit. A year. Then whoever he was seeing would suddenly be last year's model, you know, and there was nothing to show off there."

"And you didn't resent that?"

"Actually I saw it coming and beat him to the punch. By that time I had him pretty well figured out and was starting to feel sorry for him. And you can't love somebody you feel sorry for."

"Why'd you feel sorry for him? I thought he was this super success?"

"Well, that's why. It was a sickness. I really believe that, that he was a sick man. He couldn't lose at anything, or even have the appearance of losing. He didn't care about what was real-it was all the appearance."

"So what happened with Hector Medina?"

"Well, I think that's mostly why I broke it off. He just had to prove to me that he was right about Medina. He'd said it in front of a group of us, and he wasn't going to back down. We fought about it. I wanted him to just let it go. I mean, what did it matter? Medina might not have been a great cop, but he wasn't worse than a lot of others. He had a family, all that. Why stir it up? The original investigation had cleared him. But Rusty got on his high horse and there was no getting him off."

"But why?"

"That's the question, isn't it? At first, no doubt about it, he thought it impressed me, or would impress me. Solo prosecutor takes on the police department and district attorney's office and brings in a righteous conviction. He thought it would make him more romantic. The Serpico of San Francisco…"

"And that passed, the part about impressing you, I mean?"

"Well, it never really worked, but after he committed himself…" She shrugged. "But that was just Rusty. His ego."

"And to hell with Medina, right?"

"Oh, Medina didn't even exist to Rusty. He was just another trophy, like I was, I guess. He eventually got off again anyway."

"But lost his job."

"I know. No one believed him after the second investigation, but there wasn't enough evidence to bring him to trial, so he walked, but to everybody he was a killer cop."

"Do you think he was?"

"He had a reputation for being mean. Little things lots of guys do-maybe an extra thwack with the sap, cuffs tight enough to cut-nothing heavy, but they came out in the investigation."

"You know about now, the accusation against him?"

"Killing that dog? He might have done that."

"And how about Rusty? Killing him?"